Data storage solutions on speed versus performance

Data storage solutions on speed versus performance

By Michael

June 5, 2012

Companies need easier, better, faster and stronger backup storage solutions to combat the multitude of threats beating at the door. Outages, thefts, attacks and losses are raining on business data like a hail of flaming arrows according to the folks at the Open Security Foundation.

Runaway data train

The big stumbling block for backup tape is consistently the speed at which it runs. Many supporters of the internet say cloud storage is an instantaneous backup solution, while virtualization and deduplication still have faster backup times than disk. Tape is well in the dust, considering even the newest incarnations of backup tape management clock around 240MB per second, and that’s the best speed magnetic tape can offer.

At the same time, though, that 240MB/sec rate is feeding into 5TB of solid-state storage. Imagine forcing all that data into the cloud and then needing to access the document archive for complete backup imaging in the event of data theft or loss. You should be imagining a pinched straw, with a local server sucking a gigantic chunk of information through a too-small broadband connection.

Would you like backup files with that

People like to think about convenience in the moment, which could explain why some businesses want to jump on the cloud bandwagon and leave themselves hanging. Without a secondary archive or additional backup tape management, a power outage or a cloud meltdown (because cloud providers have to host their data somewhere too, you know) can spell disaster for business continuity.

The worms crawl in

“These days, organisations are at the mercy of complex viruses like Duqu and Stuxnet,” said Samresh Ramjith, a technology and operations specialist in an interview with ITWeb. “[These viruses] are designed specifically to steal corporate information.

Hosting a full suite of sensitive business information online is also an open invitation to attacks. Data in the cloud is, to an extent, floating in the soupy aether of the world wide web with only nominal security protocols protecting it in some cases. Internal and external threats can all have a turn trying to get past passwords and other measures without ever notifying a business that its data may be under attack.

An even trade

Companies willing to spend the extra time archiving to backup tape obtain the peace of mind that data is safely stored offline, properly maintained, and available for retrieval whenever it may be deemed necessary.